Remy #2
“Which means”—Lin hands me her cabin bag—“I need to shower.” She takes the stairs to the bathroom two at a time while Nova makes herself comfortable in the living room, pulling out her phone and switching on the TV.
“We asked your mum if we could stay for the bank holiday weekend,” Melissa explains. “So she’s gone and she’ll be back on Tuesday.”
“What about Isaiah?” I ask. “You’ve never been apart.”
“Felix has him. I’m good for a few days.”
“Hi, yeah.” I turn around to see Nova on the sofa with her feet up and her ear pressed against her phone.
“Hey, Carrie. Ayyy, long time! You know who the fuck’s calling!
Ha! But listen, same order, different address.
Let me get a small veg pizza, a large pepperoni, and a medium margherita with red onions and extra cheese. ”
Lin and Melissa busy themselves with the pizzas when they arrive, and I lie on Nova’s lap while she tries to explain the latest drama with the Real Housewives of Somewhere, but really, I’m just happy to be close to her and to hear her voice.
It’s like old times but sprinkled with doses of reality: Lin speaks of jet lag and calls the hoover a vacuum; Melissa’s evening phone calls are to her husband and her son.
What I also can’t escape is that everyone’s doing well.
Nova’s business is booming, Melissa has the family she’s always wanted, and Lin loves life in New York.
I try to focus on the present, on having them all in the same room for the first time since we said goodbye to Lin at the airport seven months ago, but it hurts that our breakup has yielded good things for them and terrible things for me because, if good things happen as a result of something falling away, does it mean that the original something was never meant to last?
Melissa books Dishoom for dinner on Sunday evening, and once we’ve all ordered, I work up my courage to ask, “What happens after this? When you all leave tomorrow?”
Melissa answers first and it’s clearly a conversation she’s been waiting to have.
“We can’t hide the fact that we’re all going down different paths, and I think we need to be realistic about what we want from each other, and what we can give,” she says.
“So, let’s agree to be honest tonight, and I mean really honest. How are we going to make this work? ”
Each of us takes turns looking at one another.
“Or should I say—do we want to make this work?” Melissa continues.
“We all know how Remy feels, so I’ll go.
With my life as it currently stands, I am happy, but I’m also aware that I will never find friends like the three of you again.
And to be honest, I’m not looking to. I know you three will always be there, and that’s what made it easy to move in the first place.
We have all the technology needed for consistent communication, and I just had a baby, so I thought I’d be too mentally preoccupied to miss you all, but I do.
A lot, in fact. I miss Nova’s dramatic retellings of the everyday, Lin’s court cases, and Remy’s foodie rambles.
At home, I’m Felix’s wife and Isaiah’s mum.
My work clients are being taken care of by my employees, and I find that without my friends, I forget who I am sometimes.
I realize that you all were a constant reminder of my identity.
When… when Remy came to visit, it was like she brought a bit of me with her, and I had to give it back when she left. I cried myself to sleep that night.”
I reach out to take her hand, and typical Melissa, she’s quick to put our minds at ease.
“Don’t get me wrong,” she says. “I love my family and my house; it’s what I’ve always wanted, and I honestly wouldn’t trade it all if I could, but on a lot of days, I’ve just been keeping busy to distract myself from how much I miss you three.
I feel silly as a new mum saying something as juvenile as ‘I miss my friends,’ but Felix says that I’m not just missing my friends, I’m missing pieces of my heart, and therefore, myself. ”
Something about Melissa’s confession emboldens Lin to go next.
“We said honest, right? Okay. I threw myself into another friendship group in New York to try and replace you guys. Sometimes it’s fun, but other times, most times, I notice that it isn’t the same.
We just don’t have that kind of bond with each other that comes from years of shared memories.
I thought because I’m the one farthest away, I should just cut ties, give you all space, let you continue without me.
I’ll jump into my exciting new life and try and force my way into a new group and make it like our one.
But that was never going to happen. You three are kind of irreplaceable, and the more I realized that and knew there wasn’t anything I could do about it, the more I wanted to distance myself.
I’m sorry if I’ve seemed cold. I’ve been trying to make my situation work, but something I have to accept is that, because of the decision I made, I can no longer have what I’ve had for so long, if that makes sense. It’s been a tough pill to swallow.”
We all turn to Nova. “What?” she says. “I’m having a great time!
” Eventually, her shoulders slump. “Okay, fine. I broke up with David again so I’ve just been focusing on work.
I don’t have new best friends or a partner, but I have a thriving business that keeps me stupid busy, at least. I spend a lot of time telling myself I don’t need you lot, and as soon as Lin left, I just thought, fuck it.
We make so much sense as a foursome, so I figured if one member was down, there wasn’t any point, which I know now was downright disrespectful, especially to you, Remy.
But honestly, I personally feel like we need all of us to be a group for this friendship to work like it has before. ”
“We could sit here and say we’re all going to meet up every month,” Melissa says.
“Or that we’ll FaceTime weekly, or we’ll revive the group chat, but we’d be kidding ourselves.
That’s not how sustaining a friendship works, not with us anyway.
Lin’s in New York, Nova’s business is taking off, I have a family outside of London, and Remy, your life in six months is going to look different to how it does today, regardless of what you decide. So, what will work for us?”
“Maybe we just don’t apply so much pressure to it.” Everyone turns to me, probably just as surprised as I am to be saying this considering the email I sent to them days ago.
Simone once said I was like a pendulum, but I think we all are.
We feel one way about something, and then in as little as twelve hours, we can feel completely different.
Yesterday, I was afraid and pessimistic about our friendship’s future.
The day before that I went to bed believing it didn’t matter what happened after this bank holiday weekend—we’d always be friends for life. I’m back to feeling that way today.
“Maybe we just agree to continue loving each other,” I say, “to not feel so guilty that we end up ghosting instead of reaching out with what we do have to offer. And we vow that when another one of us needs this kind of weekend, we do it. We accept that we won’t be making as many new memories together but also that we won’t stop making them entirely or let go of the ones we do have.
I guess the only promise we can make to each other is to do our best, and to not define our friendship by proximity or frequency.
Our friendship means something else now; it has to mean something that works with our circumstances and that we can all agree on.
” I pause and look at the faces of the three women I love most. “We define it by the fact that Nova still knows our pizza orders, that no one has to convince Lin to jump on an eight-hour flight with twenty-four hours’ notice, or that we’re the only ones who can get Melissa to leave her idyllic setup and return to London.
Consider this a renewing of our vows. Our circumstances have changed drastically but one thing hasn’t: Let’s promise to stay in love with each other. ”
While Nova and Lin smile and Melissa delicately wipes at her eyes, I realize in that moment how true this is.
Since Lin left, we’ve shared video calls, I’ve seen her in Amsterdam, and she went full-on bounty-hunter mode to find Ishir.
Mel and I haven’t been in constant communication, but we talk a lot, and I hate to admit it, but she’s really not that far away; I’ve spent more time trying to get into central London during a tube strike.
Plus, those moments spent in her garden were some of the most peaceful moments I’ve had this year.
Then there’s Nova. It’s been turbulent, but the fact that she called me, knowing I would come and hold her tight on the steps in Shoreditch, and that she canceled one of her busiest working weekends to come and do the same for me, counts for something—it counts for a lot.
“We can’t fight what’s changing for us or pretend it’s not happening,” I tell them, “but I hear there’s a resurgence on long-distance relationships and they have a pretty impressive success rate.
Maybe one day we’ll find each other again, back in the same spot.
Let that maybe , that possibility, keep us together. ”
We all raise our glasses. “And that speech,” says Nova, “is the reason why you’re the writer.”